How to Make Friends in Real Life

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0:00:00 – (Christine Hoover): I think that’s the big problem is that we don’t have an understanding of what friendship should look like. So we have this ideal in our head, and that ideal just is detrimental to us in so many ways.

0:00:20 – (Courtney Doctor): Welcome to the Deep Dish, a podcast from the Gospel Coalition where we love having deep conversations about deep truths. I am Courtney Docter. I’m here with my friend and co host, Melissa Krueger, and we are joined by our friend, Christine Hoover. Christine, welcome.

0:00:36 – (Christine Hoover): Thanks for having me. So glad to be here. Yeah.

0:00:40 – (Courtney Doctor): Well, I love listening to you talk about what we’re going to be talking about today. But Christine is the author of many books and Bible studies. She’s also a pastor’s wife and the women’s ministry associate at the Northwest congregation of the Austin Stone Church in Austin, Texas.

0:00:55 – (Melissa Kruger): And we are so excited because we’re gonna talk today about friendship. And I know you’ve written on this, Christine. You’ve spoken at our conferences on this, and it was interest. This was one, I think, of our biggest breakouts at the conference. It’s always interesting what rises to the surface as a topic because it’s really telling. And I think it’s because this topic, making friends, is almost something we all want, but it seems increasingly difficult in our culture. And I don’t know if it’s because we move so much.

0:01:27 – (Melissa Kruger): I don’t know if it’s because just culturally, things have changed and we have social media and we think we have 5,000 friends, but we don’t feel like we have one good friend. I don’t. I’m not really sure, but have you ever had a season in your life where it was just kind of really difficult to make friends?

0:01:47 – (Christine Hoover): Absolutely. I think everyone. I think it’s such a topic that people want to talk about because friendship is hard. And I just want to acknowledge that straight away. Like, I. I’m speaking about it, I’ve written about it, but I. I struggle with this. This is something that is just. In the past month, I’ve been praying about how do I handle this situation, how do I pursue this person, that kind of thing? And so I. I just think it’s hard for everyone.

0:02:12 – (Christine Hoover): So there have been times where I’ve gone through seasons where I’ve asked myself, do I even have a friend? And. And how do I deepen these friendships? And so, absolutely, yes, I think everyone could say yes to that question. It’s hard.

0:02:27 – (Courtney Doctor): Yeah. When we first moved, I was newly married and had one little baby. And then a second little baby came along really quickly. And we moved to Jackson, Mississippi, and you know, we didn’t have any of our support system, no family, no anything. And I remember it’s probably the loneliest year of my life. I had, you know, I wasn’t far out of college where friends are just all around you and you’re just kind of doing everything in that friend group. And so I was an adult now I’m a married woman. I’m a mom, and I mean, not one friend. And I ended up at a park. I was pushing my oldest in a stroller, pregnant with my second one. And I saw this group of three women over at a park bench. And one of them looked over and waved and I literally, I looked behind me because I didn’t believe she was actually waving to me. But that was the beginning of the Lord’s answer and to friendship in that season.

0:03:22 – (Courtney Doctor): But yeah, I agree, we’ve all had those seasons where we long. And I think part of it too, we have this narrative that everybody has a best friend that they grew up with and their friends until they’re 80. And I just don’t think that’s true for most people.

0:03:35 – (Christine Hoover): That’s right. I think that’s the big problem is that we don’t have an understanding of what friendship should look like. So we have this ideal in our head and that ideal just is detrimental to us in so many ways.

0:03:48 – (Courtney Doctor): Oh, that’s good. That ideal is detrimental to us. Well, we’ve talked about that before, that like frustration comes between expectation and reality.

0:03:57 – (Melissa Kruger): Well, now I’m going to say that’s what Courtney lives in with me, like expectation and reality. And so she gets to practice this a lot. But no, I think it’s funny what you were saying, Courtney. I think the 20s is a really hard time to figure out friendship because you went from a season where everyone that was kind of in the same life stage in general, and look, no one had nice things. We all lived in really pretty ugly housing generally, you know, like with multiple roommates.

0:04:30 – (Melissa Kruger): You know, everything was kind of the same. You know, maybe someone had a nicer comforter than you. But goodness, you know, it was just to then your 20s, where some people have resources to travel and do fun things, some people are just still living in their parents basement trying to find a job. You know, I mean, like it’s, it’s a. I think it’s the first time lives start to really diverge. And so people who you thought, I’m going to be friends with this person forever, well, their life takes a totally different trajectory than yours. And I think that complicates friendship. So seasons of life changes. You might connect in one season of life, but maybe in the next season of life, you don’t connect. And for us, it was moving. We move so many times in the first few years, and a lot of people are doing this. We were moving for my husband’s job, and then we were moving for educational reasons. And every one of those is like an upheaval of friendship.

0:05:24 – (Melissa Kruger): And I think that can make it tricky. But I also think this expectation is a really good point. And so let me ask you this. What would be kind of your. What, what should we think of when we think of gospel friendship? What does it look like to have a gospel friend? You know, because I think there’s this notion of I have my best friend and it’s almost possessive, like, this is my person, and we talk about it sometimes that way.

0:05:50 – (Melissa Kruger): Whereas, what’s a little bit different about thinking about friendship in terms of gospel centeredness?

0:05:56 – (Christine Hoover): I think that’s such an important question because that’s really getting to. We don’t want to idolize friendship and what we think it should be in this perfect picture. And so what is the real picture of friendship as God has designed it in this time where we live, where we live with sin? And I think that. That the gospel gives us itself, gives us a picture of what gospel friendship is, that it’s a relationship where we tell each other the truth.

0:06:21 – (Christine Hoover): You know, that sometimes we have to confront friends, we have to be confronted. We. We rub up against people who also are sinners. And so there’s going to be conflict. A lot of times we don’t leave room for that in our idea of what friendship should be. And so we run away when things are hard. And also forgiveness is a part of the gospel that God extends himself toward us and he extends his mercy toward us. And so we need to be ready to do that for other people. And sometimes it’s when they come to us with something that sometimes it’s just bearing with them and who they are that they are sinners. And we’re going to be willing to continue to engage in that way. So I think those are the kind of main components that come to mind for me. What about y’? All?

0:07:03 – (Courtney Doctor): Well, I remember reading a book in the 90s by Dee Breaston called the Friendships of Women. And there’s a line, and I’ll probably kind of botch it a little bit, but. But she said it’s stuck with me in so many different relationships. But she said it is theologically sound to expect your friends to fail you. And then she quoted, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, she said. So as a gospel friend, what you want to do is decide on the front end what your response is going to be. And a gospel centered friend, the response is going to be to forgive, to bear with, to to persevere when our friends fail us, frustrate us, and because we want them to do the same.

0:07:41 – (Christine Hoover): That’s right. That’s what I was going to say is we also have to remember that we are sinners and we bring that into our relationships as well.

0:07:48 – (Courtney Doctor): Yes, well. And I think this idea of having friendships that are not just we think about our Christian friends. Right, Friendships with Christian women. But I have had friendships with Christian women that are not necessarily gospel centered friendships. They don’t look any different than my friendships with non Christian women. They’re based on, you know, just, I don’t know, just the things we’re doing together. And we don’t ever. It’s what you said, Christine. We don’t ever speak truth to each other.

0:08:14 – (Courtney Doctor): And so how can, how can we really understand, like the role of friendship and the goal of friendship from a biblical perspective and even looking at Jesus and how does his life give us like a glimpse into what the Lord intends for us as embodied creatures, as embodied people as we walk this life?

0:08:37 – (Christine Hoover): Well, I think the goal of deep Christian friendship is our sanctification and that we would be a vessel that God uses to sanctify our friends. So I think about one of my good friends that recently, you know, I invited her, I wanted to let her know this is how I think of you. I think of you as a deep friend. And I want to invite you into speaking into my blind spots because there’s very few people who will do that, especially as a pastor’s wife, you know, and so I need you to do that. And I, I think, I mean, Jesus didn’t have blind spots, he didn’t need the disciples to do that, but he lived, moved, you know, did ministry with his friends to allow them to experience him and to be sanctified, be changed and transformed by being in community with him. And so I think that can be our goal too, is just that we would be the type of community that would be changed and would help bring change to our friends.

0:09:33 – (Melissa Kruger): That’s such a good point, Christine. I’ve been studying the Gospel of Mark. And one thing, I’ve been looking at these four different little vignettes with Jesus as He interacts with people. And the first one is all of these crowds are gathered around him, pressing on him. And, you know, he serves them, but he’s also trying to get away with them. But then the very next one that I’ve never really related to that one is Jesus and the 12, and it says that they were to be with him.

0:10:01 – (Melissa Kruger): And it’s. To me, it’s this very relational aspect, like I always thought. Yeah, he called these people to be his followers, his specific followers. And it does say they were going to preach the gospel and do these things, but the first thing it said was that they were to be with him. So in the midst of. Of all these crowds following him. And then the next vignette is actually the Pharisees who are opposing him.

0:10:22 – (Melissa Kruger): So he had these. This opposition, and he had these followers. And then it even says this is also the passage where his family’s coming in, and his family is like, he’s lost his mind. So even his family’s failing him. You know, the Pharisees are condemning him, the crowds are pressing in on him. And yet he chose the 12 to be with him. And to me, it’s a sweet picture of the God of all the universe, the triune God chose when he walked this earth to develop deep and intimate friendships. And we know at the end of Mark’s gospel, every one of them deserted him yet, but he still chose it.

0:10:59 – (Melissa Kruger): And to me, that’s such an example of just like he chose to get away and rest, he chose what was spiritually healthy. It’s spiritually healthy to have friendships. So we can sometimes look at the hard and say, yeah, just not going to do that. I’m going to be lone Ranger. I’ll. I’ll go to church. But you can’t trust people. You know, you can’t trust people. What would you say to someone who’s kind of in that bitter place? Maybe like.

0:11:24 – (Melissa Kruger): Yeah, I try. Female friendships, they just, you know, they always. There’s gossip, there’s betrayal. They’re fluffy conversations about things I don’t want to talk about. We hear that a lot in women’s ministry. Yeah. Oh, the women just, you know, no one’s talking about anything interesting. What do we say to that woman when we are that woman sometimes? And how do we move into those spaces and be the friend we want to be?

0:11:52 – (Christine Hoover): Yes. Well, I think that hard is part of. Is part of it. And that God has allowed hard in all of life, including friendship. And for some reason, we hold friendship to be this. We think that it’s kind of. I always say it’s our last dream to die as women because we think we can find this ideal relationship and we spend our whole life searching for it. But in fact, if we just embrace that God has written hard into it for a reason for our growth and our sanctification, then I think we’re more willing to continue to engage when we get hurt. So I do want to acknowledge we all get hurt and we hurt people.

0:12:30 – (Christine Hoover): And I’ve been hurt at times where I have needed to pull back a little and let God bring some healing in my life and help give me some perspective. And I have had the thoughts of, is this worth it? Is this worth it for me to continue to put myself out there and to pursue and to make myself vulnerable to other people and to be hurt again. And I’ve come to the conclusion that, yes, it is worth it. And some of it’s kind of what you said, Melissa, that Jesus himself modeled this. This is something that is for our health and our good, even the hard parts.

0:13:05 – (Christine Hoover): I have grown and been sanctified primarily through relationships, and hopefully God has used me and other people’s lives for that as well. This is what we are designed for and so to continue to engage. There’s a verse in Proverbs that says that basically a fool isolates themselves, that wise people seek community. And I think wise people also seek good community, and they also. They bring themselves well into it. Meaning, I would say sometimes when we get frustrated with friendship and we want to disengage and isolate, it’s because we’re thinking about ourselves and we’re thinking about what we want and how other people have disappointed us. And so a lot of times I need to.

0:13:53 – (Christine Hoover): When I have needed to pull back and to reorient, it’s to remember that I am not that as a believer imitating how Jesus loves us, that he came toward us, he pursued me with grace and mercy and truth that I am to consider more often how I can engage people. How can I be a blessing? Everyone’s been hurt, so how can I be a good friend to people? How can I bring in the outsider, the people who are, as you’re saying, the crowd standing by that Jesus wants to come in.

0:14:33 – (Christine Hoover): I want to be that person that sees that person. And so I have found that there’s much more joy in relationships when I have the perspective of how can I be a blessing? Rather than, well, I’m disappointed. I mean, I. I get disappointed a lot. I think we all do. And so it’s a. It’s a. A matter of just acknowledging that and saying, this is how it is, but we’re gonna continue to love as Jesus has loved us. I found joy in that. And. And I do think it’s worth it on the other side, working to build relationships. Working meaning working through conflict or bearing with somebody who’s suffering, a friend who has nothing to give for a season, that we want to bear with them. There’s so much fruit and richness on the other side of that. And at my age, I’ve experienced that.

0:15:20 – (Christine Hoover): And so I do think that that is worth it for that reason as well. Hmm.

0:15:24 – (Courtney Doctor): I hear you saying, like, keep the long view in mind. Work to have a biblical understanding of friendship, your own need for friendship. That as, I mean, Jesus needed friends. We certainly, you know, it is not good for man to be alone. And we actually need people around us speaking into our lives and doing community together, because it is. It is good for us. It is life giving it a. Sanctifying. It is all these things.

0:15:52 – (Courtney Doctor): And so for the woman who. Who maybe is jaded and is like, I actually just prefer to be alone, or to the woman who is super frustrated with all of her friendships, I hear you saying every friendship will frustrate us because. And we frustrate all of our friends. And so there’s this long view that I hear you calling women to have both a biblical understanding, a biblical foundation, but then this long view understanding of, yeah, we bear with one another and as they bear with us. And. And we do this, we pursue wholeness and we pursue Christ together. Right. Ultimately.

0:16:26 – (Courtney Doctor): Well, I want to get really practical then, because I think we’ve all been in this situation where we’re the new girl or we’re trying something new. And, you know, the scenario that comes to my mind is walking into a new room.

0:16:41 – (Christine Hoover): Yes.

0:16:41 – (Courtney Doctor): For a women’s Bible study. Because I think we would all advocate, like, hey, this is good to build these kind of friendships within your local church. And showing up at women’s Bible study, even if they’re not studying the book you want to study, even if they don’t, you know, do the study in the order that you want or whatever. You know, we all have little things that we wish our local churches might do differently, but you show up and you walk into that room and it can be terrifying. I mean, I’ve been there. Maybe you don’t know a soul.

0:17:10 – (Courtney Doctor): Maybe you just feel really like this is going to be a place of great vulnerability for you. Maybe everybody already knows each other. They’ve been doing life together for, you know, five years. And so a lot of us are either tempted not to go or just to kind of stay very protected. So what is your advice? How can we show up in these spaces with this true and deep and honest longing for friendships when it’s hard?

0:17:38 – (Christine Hoover): Yeah, well, that’s a great question. And I’m an introvert, so I can understand the. I always kind of have to gear up when I’m going into some sort of group situation. What I’ve found and what I would say to women is don’t just go once, commit to going every week. Let’s say it’s a 12 week Bible study. Go every week and show up and share something with your small group or that kind of thing. But you’re talking about the very first time. And I would say that to me sometimes just even acknowledging to myself, I feel awkward right now.

0:18:10 – (Christine Hoover): This is awkward. What am I going to do with this? And I would say turn and watch the door for the next person who comes in, who is new. And you go toward them and say, hi, I’m Christine, I’m new. I’ve never been here. Have you been here before? You know, just something to get the conversation rolling. So I would say focus on a one to one conversation. Don’t try to go up to the group because that will make you feel even more awkward.

0:18:35 – (Christine Hoover): But you be the one to say, I know I feel this way. And so there’s someone else in this room that feels this way, probably a lot of people. And so how can I be a blessing to the next person who comes in the door who looks like they don’t know what’s going on? So look for, look for the outsider and you be the one to welcome them even though you’re new too, you know, and you want to be welcomed. But just to get the ball rolling and get over the awkwardness, I think sometimes letting it sit there, like if I’m just sitting in it, it’s even worse. And then I get in my head and so I just try to do something right away to get over that feeling of awkwardness.

0:19:13 – (Melissa Kruger): I love what you said about you being you looking. Because what we’re doing is looking inward. Like everyone’s looking at me. They all see that I’m standing here awkwardly by myself. And instead you switch the perspective and say you look around and maybe there’s another girl standing awkwardly in the corner that you could go talk to. And one thing I try to do with my kids is prep them with three questions like, my daughter just went to orientation, and I said, have three questions that you have in your register. Oh, where are you from?

0:19:46 – (Melissa Kruger): What’s your major going to be? What dorm are you living? I gave her three questions so just to set her at ease so she could engage with others. And I think if you’re walking into that space, even thinking before you go in, like, my questions in that space are, how long have you been at this church? You know, I’ll say something like that. Have you done this Bible study before? Where do you find the coffee? I don’t know, like, just some practical thing because people love to be like, I can show her where to get the coffee.

0:20:16 – (Christine Hoover): You know, that.

0:20:17 – (Melissa Kruger): Just going in, preparing. So, like, I think preparing our hearts even to just know how to get that first step in the door can be so helpful, especially in new situations. And we’ve all been in new situations where we feel like we’re back in middle school. We’re holding our tray, and we don’t know where to sit. And so another thing, I tell my kids a lot, especially daughters, I feel like this is. My son doesn’t seem to care, but my daughters do.

0:20:42 – (Melissa Kruger): I’m like, we’re all just people. Everyone in the room is looking to belong somewhere, and everyone feels like they don’t quite fit. And that helps immensely for me. Thank you so much for this conversation, Christine. I think we’re going to go to a quick break, but we’re going to come back and we’re going to talk more about friendship when we get back.

0:21:05 – (Courtney Doctor): Well, welcome back. We’re excited to continue this conversation about friendships. And we’re just acknowledging the fact that we’re all in very different places with this. And really, we’ve all probably experienced different angles of just the difficulty, the frustration, the hardship. You know, we’ve been. We’ve all acknowledged been in seasons where we’ve been really lonely and. And that a lot of times can be tied to transitions. Not just transitions into adulthood, but also moving and. And transitions into new seasons of life, a new job or.

0:21:35 – (Courtney Doctor): Or children leaving the home, or all these. All these times in life where it just becomes a little bit more difficult. And then we’re also acknowledging that there’s times that we’re just so frustrated and maybe been hurt, and we just want to kind of back away from. From all of that. And then there’s also the time when we’ve lost friends. Either they have moved away, we have moved away, we’ve had friends that have died, and so we’ve lost friends. In a variety of ways. And I think after you lose a close friend, whether that to death or even just to a cross country move, it can be really hard to kind of get back in the game and think, okay, I, I kind of lost this person that was just. I had invested so much time and energy in. And so how can we overcome like that particular reluctance? It’s not bitterness, it’s sadness that keeps us from, from wanting to pursue new friendships.

0:22:32 – (Christine Hoover): Well, I just moved recently, a couple years ago across the country and started over. And so I experienced this and I think one thing that it did, it was good because it showed me the friendships that I wanted to maintain and that I was going to make effort to continue, even though we were a long way away. But it did create in me a sense of longing. And I, and to me I just want to say longing. I think we all feel a sense of longing when it comes to community and friendship.

0:23:02 – (Christine Hoover): And that to me is a good thing because it makes me long. What we’re doing is we’re longing for perfect community in heaven. And so a lot of times what I’ll do is I’ll let that sadness kind of, I recognize it as longing. And what I’m longing for is really good. That’s a good thing. And let me just. My imagination, my sanctified imagination go wild thinking about what it will be like when we are no longer separated in heaven, but we’re not there yet. And so how can I pursue this is a good longing. So what can I do to continue to, to just to pursue, to start over? And for me that was like, hey, I really enjoyed talking to this woman. It’s almost like asking somebody out on a date, like, can I have your number? Like, would you like to go get coffee some sometime?

0:23:50 – (Christine Hoover): And, and I think that’s a part of it for me is it’s just acknowledging the longing and that that’s a really good thing and letting it, letting me kind of. I even went back to some of those friends that I moved away from and said, I really value your friendship, so let’s continue in what ways we can. But, but starting over and, and knowing that the, the gift that, that I had there, maybe there’s a gift here. And so who, who are those people that God’s pointing out to me?

0:24:16 – (Courtney Doctor): That’s so good. And I think for the woman listening that has, hasn’t experienced that or hasn’t experienced it in a long time, she’s got her friend group, she’s got her people, you know, you’re like, we’re so close, we’re so tight. We do life together. And you know what I hope that, that you’re hearing in this is that there are women coming in and out of your community that are experiencing the desire for friendship, but may look around and not see a place.

0:24:47 – (Courtney Doctor): And so how you know, both of you, I know, have a great answer to this or great wisdom in helping us understand. If you’re that person, if you think you have more than enough friends, how do you push against that and be a welcomin presence to the new girl or. Or the one that you might need to just reach out to?

0:25:07 – (Christine Hoover): I think if you’re good at being what I call a there you are person, like looking for other people, including them. There are times where I have felt or I’ve seen people around me that they feel overwhelmed with the number of relationships that they have. So I think that’s another sometimes a hard name like, how do I. I cannot be good friends with everyone. And so what I would say to women like that first, if you feel a sense of territorial, like I. I want to protect this group and no one can come in, I would ch. I would check that because I don’t think that that’s what the Bible speaks of when he’s. When the, the Bible speaks of church or community, I think there should be a sense of movement and activity. People in and people out. We’re sending people we’re receiving.

0:25:52 – (Christine Hoover): And so I, I would say to check that there may be a sense of idolatry attached to some of that. Looking for that perfection that only can come later. And so I would say that. But also, if you’re a person that’s like, there’s a lot of people in my life and I sometimes feel overwhelmed by that. I would say to think of yourself instead of a cul de sac, think of yourself as like an intersection. Like, how can I intersect people?

0:26:20 – (Christine Hoover): So maybe there’s someone that’s new. I can’t take them on necessarily. That sounds bad, but, you know, I may not have the capacity for deep friendship with them, but hey, I know somebody who would be a good fit for them. Let me, Let me bring that person in, include that person and connect them specifically with another woman. That I think would be a good way. Me a mentor or they have something in common. But using the influence that I have with all of these relationships to create other connections that are really.

0:26:56 – (Christine Hoover): It’s almost like you’re releasing them. You know, you’re releasing them, you’re still there. And you have a relationship, but you’re not the sole responsible. Does that make sense?

0:27:06 – (Courtney Doctor): Yes.

0:27:07 – (Melissa Kruger): I love that too, because it. It also says I don’t have to be the center of it.

0:27:10 – (Christine Hoover): Right.

0:27:11 – (Melissa Kruger): Like, sometimes people are uncomfortable with that because they want everyone. They’re afraid for their friends to be friends because then maybe they’ll be boss friends. Yeah, exactly. Versus say, no, we’re friends. I love seeing you be friends, and that’s actually a good thing. One thing I know that friendship has done in my own life is really helped grow me into a better. I see the gifts in other people and I’m like, oh, wow, I want to be more like that now. Sometimes it can overwhelm me.

0:27:47 – (Melissa Kruger): I was with a group of friends actually this past weekend, and I was like, oh, wow, this one friend is so amazing at this. And this other friend is so good at this in ways I am not good.

0:28:00 – (Christine Hoover): Yeah.

0:28:00 – (Melissa Kruger): I mean, she is just, like, fun. I was watching her as we were going to different places. She talks to everyone everywhere she goes.

0:28:07 – (Courtney Doctor): I have a friend that I am.

0:28:08 – (Melissa Kruger): And I was like, man, I am not good at that. And the other, like, takes people into her home on a regular basis. And I mean, loves.

0:28:18 – (Christine Hoover): Really loves the hard people.

0:28:20 – (Melissa Kruger): Well, you know, and another is just empathetic. She’s going to be the one to cry with you and all this. And so I think there’s this right thing. I’m like, oh, you know, appreciating our friends and learning to grow from them, but also accepting our own limitations in friendship. Like, I don’t. I think it can be a temptation to become just like our friends. Like, oh, I’ve got to do exactly what this friend’s doing or that friend’s doing, or I’m not in some ways.

0:28:52 – (Courtney Doctor): Right.

0:28:53 – (Melissa Kruger): So how. How do we strike that balance? Like, in friendship, learning from people and growing from people, but also acknowledging, hey, you might be a finger and I might be a toe, and that’s okay.

0:29:04 – (Courtney Doctor): And rejoicing in it.

0:29:06 – (Christine Hoover): Yes, exactly. I mean, I think that I was thinking about this the other day. I don’t think that we. We see ourselves. It’s hard to see ourselves. Right. And so for a friend to say, hey, I see this in you, and God is using that a lot of times. I mean, when that happens to me, I’m like, really? I. I can’t necessarily see that. And so thank you. That’s so encouraging. And I want to continue to run that race that God set before me. And so I think I would say when we notice those things, to say those things to our friends and to encourage them.

0:29:41 – (Christine Hoover): Because I think sometimes what I do the same thing where I turn it inward and I think, oh well, I’m not like that. Should I be like that? And it’s not a Holy Spirit conviction. It’s more a Christine conviction of I’m trying to be all things, all people or I need to be this perfect person or whatever, but maybe just let it be a God nudging you to encourage a friend. And that’s what we’re called to do. I love all the one anothers in scripture and, and, and one of them is to encourage one another so that we can continue to run this race together toward that finish line in heaven with Jesus.

0:30:14 – (Courtney Doctor): I love that. I love. I’m going back to something you said about being an intersection, not a cul de sac. I think that is such a beautiful word picture. And one reason I like it, besides everything you said about it is we’ve talked about this before, this idea that if your friend group becomes very stagnant and, and you start kind of idolizing like the, that group as a, as a whole, that is not going to shift or morph in any way, then that’s a real red flag.

0:30:44 – (Courtney Doctor): Especially the smaller the group, the more the red flag that it is. Right? It becomes exclusive. And I just don’t think that those exclusive friendships or friend groups are healthy. I think that we need to kind of what you were even saying, Melissa, like rejoice in each other’s friendships. I remember way back in the day I had a friend who introduced me as her. No, she introduced my friend as her best friend’s best friend. So she was just like acknowledging that her best friend had a best friend that wasn’t her. It was kind of this. And I was kind of like, that’s the healthiest thing I’ve ever heard. You know, like to be okay with that. It was really.

0:31:20 – (Courtney Doctor): But even that, even that phrase, best friend, there’s a superlative exclusiveness to, to it that, you know, I think it’s healthy to even be saying things like one of my best friends, one of my closest friends, one of my dearest. But that one of just puts that caveat on it that reminds you and the other person and it reminds the two of you like, okay, this isn’t exclusive, but also it tells other people, oh, there’s room for more.

0:31:49 – (Courtney Doctor): She’s just one of a few. And I do think back to Christ’s example. We can overplay this probably. But I think that there is a Lot to be said to the fact that there were 12 and there were three.

0:32:02 – (Christine Hoover): Right.

0:32:02 – (Courtney Doctor): And there was one. And so even that, like our capacity just acknowledging that even Christ as far as how he was really going to do life and, and do life together, share his life with others, that was really deeply intimate with 12 and then there were three that he was just a lot closer with and, and revealed himself even more to those three. And I, I just think that there’s something in that for us that’s very freeing. It’s not a, it’s, it’s not prescriptive, but it is helpful to think about the fact that even Christ in his incarnation was, was limited in that and, and he functioned within that. Melissa, I can tell you’re about to say something.

0:32:47 – (Melissa Kruger): Sorry, you don’t. You know my face? You know my face. No, I was just. When you were saying that, I was remembering that C.S. lewis quote and he talked about they had just lost one of their friends. And he said, you might think so if they, I don’t know if they were a group of four, group of five. And he said, you might think now I have more of Roger and Thomas and somebody else. But he goes, actually I have less of them because now that, you know, let’s say his name was John. Now that John’s gone, I’ll never see Thomas light up how he used to when John made that joke.

0:33:21 – (Melissa Kruger): So it’s like the beauty of friendship is less about. I get more when it’s just the other person. It’s actually beautiful that we get more when we’re together because I’m not enough to satisfy any person, nor is any person enough to satisfy me. But when we, you know, can see relationships actually playing off each other in a wonderful way, I think we, we can probably all see this in our families, you know, I mean, when one person is gone, you get everyone left, not more.

0:33:54 – (Courtney Doctor): It’s true. It is true.

0:33:56 – (Melissa Kruger): And I think that’s the beautiful thing about friendship. If we can be open handed and trust that the Lord’s gonna bring the right friends at just the right time, and sometimes friendship may be lacking and he’s got a purpose for that too. I mean, this is. Again, you know, there’s life lessons we try to pass on. Sometimes the lonely season has been the season. I’ve learned how to be a good friend. And it made me different when I walked into rooms where I did know everyone because I’d walked into a room where I didn’t know anyone.

0:34:27 – (Christine Hoover): Yeah.

0:34:28 – (Melissa Kruger): And that helped me be better in that Situation where I knew a lot of people to see the lonely person, to have the eyes. So a lot of this with friendship is rooted, I think, in first and foremost, having a friendship with Jesus.

0:34:44 – (Christine Hoover): Absolutely.

0:34:45 – (Melissa Kruger): And that is going to spur on other friendships. Can you talk about that? Just, you know, here at the end, how rooting ourself in a friendship with Jesus is actually going to make all of our friendships more abundant. They’re going to flourish better when we’re first rooted in Him.

0:35:03 – (Christine Hoover): Oh, I love that question. I think for me, my lonely seasons, that’s what I learned, is that I was looking to other people to. To be God to me. I needed that one, I call it the one friend to rule them all. I was looking for that person or that group to. To fill a need that only Jesus could fill. And so he, I think, sovereignly kept friendship from me so that I would see that about myself and I would turn to Him.

0:35:30 – (Christine Hoover): And that changed everything for me, my perspective on friendship, because I realized that what I had done is. I keep using this word idolizing, because I think that that’s. That’s what we do. We idealize is to idolize. We’re idolizing friendship so much and looking for that in people, but really we’re looking for them to be God to us. Or sometimes we have problems in friendship because we experience someone wanting us to be God to them.

0:35:56 – (Christine Hoover): And. And that can feel so. Oof. But, but, but. So I think for me, learning that God is God and people are people, and God is the perfect friend. He has loved me perfectly by sending his son to die on the cross for me, to bring me back into relationship, into friendship with Him. And so everything I’m looking for, this ideal relationship where I’m known fully, I’m loved fully. That will not. No one will leave me. They will not wound me. They will not abandon me.

0:36:28 – (Christine Hoover): Then that is. That is in Jesus. And so when I’m longing for that again, I think the longing is such a good sign for us to look at and say, this is a good longing. But where can it truly be found? It can only truly be found in Jesus. And when I’m secure in his love, then I can go and I can love other people as he has loved me and know that I will do it imperfectly and that they will respond imperfectly. But that’s okay, because the weight of my, you know, my validation as a person or my acceptance or whatever it is I’m looking for is not in them.

0:37:07 – (Christine Hoover): It’s in Jesus who offers me all of that fully. So to me, that’s the key is to walk with Jesus so closely and to know his love and that and the security of that, so that when we are wounded or we are a relationship does fall apart, we are not devastated as if our life has fallen apart. That is hard. But we can continue to get in the game and love people as Jesus has loved us.

0:37:37 – (Courtney Doctor): I loved what you just said about to idealize is to idolize. And so that is, you know, that’s just a really helpful little rubric. If I’m looking for something to be ideal, this friendship or this friend to be sort of this ideal, you know, movie esque friendship, then whoo, that might be a little, a little warning that I’m idolizing this idea of friendship. Well, we hope that whether you are a woman who is seeking to make her friendships deeper and more gospel centered, whether you are a woman who is lonely and longing for friendships, whether you are a woman who has been hurt and not even sure you want to keep pursuing healthy and gospel centered friendships, we hope that this episode has been both encouraging and helpful, that it is a, it is a worthy endeavor. You were not meant to do this life alone. We are meant to do this life with each other.

0:38:31 – (Courtney Doctor): We’re meant to bear with imperfect friends, imperfect people, and we’re meant for them to bear with us. And in all of it, we grow. I mean, it’s actually a huge part of what the Lord uses and to grow us towards maturity in Christ. And so please keep pursuing healthier, gospel centered friendships with the women in, in your life and in your local church. But Christine, thanks again for joining us on the Deep Dish. Our last question for you today is what is your favorite way? And I, I’m eager to hear this because I’m like you. I’ve moved multiple times and I have dear friends in each of those locations.

0:39:12 – (Courtney Doctor): And so what is your favorite way to keep in touch with friends that you’ve, that you’ve moved away from?

0:39:18 – (Christine Hoover): Well, it’s different with different people. I’m finding like some people respond better by text or that kind of thing. But my favorite way, and I get made fun of by the younger women in my life. I’m not sure why, but as Voxer, you know, the walkie talkie, do we know it?

0:39:33 – (Courtney Doctor): We feel like they should sponsor this podcast. We talk about it all the time.

0:39:37 – (Christine Hoover): Okay, well, have you ever talked to younger women about this? For some reason, younger women at our, my church are like, you use Voxer. That’s like an old school. Like they they think it’s so grandma. I don’t know.

0:39:48 – (Courtney Doctor): So funny. I just got a young woman on Voxer on Friday and I’m so excited about it. So I, I don’t know, I kind of, I kind of encourage.

0:39:58 – (Christine Hoover): Yeah. And also I like it because it doesn’t have video. I don’t like the, the video ones because every time everyone starts by, oh, I look awful, I’m sorry, my hair, whatever, you know, it’s just like let get past it and just talk, you know.

0:40:10 – (Courtney Doctor): Right. But you can hear their voice. I really love that. Yeah. My friends that any of my really dear friends that are listening that have been, you know, really stubborn about getting on Voxer, just know it is hindering our friendship. We know. Love it.

0:40:27 – (Melissa Kruger): I do love it.

0:40:29 – (Courtney Doctor): Well and I’ve, I’ve often said it’s been a really redeeming part of social media for me is to just see the, the photos and hear the quick little updates from friends in previous places that I’ve lived. So I’m really grateful for that. Well, friends, we hope you have enjoyed this episode of the Deep Dish from the Gospel Coalition. If it has been helpful, encouraging, we would love for you to like subscribe, share it with a friend and have a good conversation about what it means to have gospel centered friends. We’ll see you next time.